A report from the News and Observer in North Carolina. “In a more buyer-friendly market, said Yoana Nin, a local real estate agent whose firm serves the Triangle region. Homesellers must now ‘put in more effort’ and be willing to price homes more reasonably. ‘I think a lot of sellers are living the six-months-ago times when they think that overpricing is OK, and it’s going to get them whatever they want,’ Nin said. ‘We’re finally seeing some stabilization (on pricing), which is healthy. Nobody wants to be crazy.’”
From Alexandria Living. “Home sales are down quite a bit from this time last year — almost 29% down, according to the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors. The median sold price for a home in July 2022 was $650,000, down from June’s $684,500. ‘More options are available to homebuyers now that the market is calming. It remains a seller’s market, but the feeding frenzy has subsided somewhat. Sellers need to put their best foot forward when entering the market because buyers simply do not have the appetite or the energy to deal with unrealistic sellers. Well-maintained, updated properties that are priced correctly are still in very high demand,’ said Heather Embrey, NVAR President-Elect.”
The Orlando Business Journal in Florida. “Homebuyers no longer are at the complete mercy of sellers as the Central Florida housing market enters a new, calmer stage. In metro Orlando, 41.7% of homes for sale in July had a price drop, way up from 26.8% of homes last July, per Redfin. Likewise, price cuts are becoming more common in most U.S. markets, which means sellers are likely to change their tactics, Redfin Deputy Chief Economist Taylor Marr. ‘They’ll likely start pricing their properties lower from the get-go and become increasingly open to negotiations.’”
“That’s the case in Orlando. For example, Mainframe Real Estate LLC Realtor Anne-Marie Wurzel told Orlando Business Journal she is witnessing a change after two years of a ‘fantasy land’ market in which prices only went up and sellers made few concessions. ‘If we go back to a more normal environment, that’s OK. I think everybody really wants that … I’m seeing price adjustments and days on market are longer.’”
The Kansas City Star. “Home prices in the Kansas City area may be leveling off after years of record high prices. July data from Zillow shows Kansas City area home prices fell from June prices for the first time in seven years. The inventory of available homes is increasing — although slowly — and the number of listings with price cuts are on the rise. ‘They’re not gone in 24 to 48 hours with 15 offers like 2021,’ said Kansas City Realtor Jenny Delich. ‘It’s allowed for a leveling, but we’re not anywhere near six months of inventory to have a balanced market.’”
From Candy’s Dirt in Texas. “The Greater Fort Worth Association of Realtors (GFWAR) reported that 50 percent of all active listings in Fort Worth had a price reduction in July. Obviously, Toto is not in Kansas anymore. Certainly, sellers are bummed out the most now that the days of multiple-multiple, way-over-asking offers, and single-digit days on market have simmered down. That is not to say that multiple and over-asking offers no longer exist because they do. However, the majority of homes currently on the market are staying on the market a little bit longer (Oh no … 30 days!).”
“With a 40 percent increase in listings from July 2022 compared to July 2021 it’s evident that sellers are trying to catch the tail end of the frenzy … but they just missed it. Price Improvement. Price Reduction. Pricing Adjustment. Perfected Pricing. Pretty Pretty Please Pricing. The list of hilarious terms and phrases from Realtors to notify of a price drop is so amusing. I have to admit I am one of those real estate sales professionals that is constantly seeking new terminology to say, ‘Hey, we tried on a higher price but now the market has shifted so we are dropping the list price … so bring me a buyer and a contract!’”
The Philadelphia Inquirer. “Toll Bros., the Fort Washington-based builder of million-dollar homes, says it suffered a 60% drop in new orders during the three months ended July 31. ‘There is little consolation or ways to sugarcoat’ the ‘dramatic’ drop in new orders, home-stocks analyst Buck Horne told clients at Raymond James Financial Inc. in a report. At about $47 a share, Toll’s price now reflects only the approximate ‘book value’ of the properties it controls, and not future profits. That’s a big change from last December, when Toll shares briefly topped $75.”
“‘As soon as mortgage rates took off in reaction to rising long-term interest rates, housing demand cooled, and the euphoria that infected the housing market ended,’ James M. Meyer, chief investment officer at Tower Bridge Advisors, told clients.”
From CNBC. “Home prices declined 0.77% from June to July, the first monthly fall in nearly three years, according to Black Knight. While the drop may seem small, it is the largest single-month decline in prices since January 2011. It is also the second-worst July performance dating back to 1991, behind the 0.9% decline in July 2010, during the Great Recession. Some local markets are seeing even steeper declines over the last few months. San Jose, California, saw the largest, with home prices now down 10% in recent months, followed by Seattle (-7.7%), San Francisco (-7.4%), San Diego (-5.6%), Los Angeles (-4.3%) and Denver (-4.2%).”
The Telegraph in the UK. “Banks and surveyors are ‘down valuing’ as many as half of homes in some parts of the country amid fears sharp house price falls are on the horizon. Anthony Harris, of Continuum, a financial advice firm which manages over £1.53bn in mortgages and other assets, said: ‘I am seeing more than 50pc of purchase applications being down valued at present.’ This level is likely to rise further, he added. ‘Sellers are asking high prices and there always seems to be more than two buyers who are prepared to enter a bit of a bidding war, pushing up prices further. But the lenders’ surveyors are not supporting the prices agreed.’”
The Korea Herald. “The housing market in Seoul appears to have entered a period of stagnation not only with the prices of apartments — the major residential type in the city –dropping, but also the number of transactions falling due to increased interest rates on loans, data showed. Even Seocho-gu, a residential district in southern Seoul with high demand that had resisted any price drop since the third week of February, saw trading prices finally fall last week. For the third quarter of this year, 54.7 percent of Seoul apartments on the market have traded at a lower price — the highest percentage of cheaper housing trading observed in the recent decade.”
“In the first quarter of this year, only 3,333 apartments were traded in Seoul — the least traded during a quarter since 2013. ‘Housing transactions are not taking place even though the apartments are on the market at a lower price. That is how much the apartment market in Seoul has contracted,’ said an official from Korea Real Estate Board.”
Stuff New Zealand. “The Reserve Bank now predicts house prices could fall up to 20% from their peaks. Depending on where you sit that is a serious concern, or music to the ears. To investor Matthew Ryan, the Reserve Bank’s prediction is more than a forecast – it is a stated intention. ‘When you control some or a portion of the market pricing mechanism, your statements are not prediction, they are guidance on intended policy direction and outcomes,’ he said. ‘If you provide free sweets to children, but then go ‘we can’t believe we’ve created some tooth decay for the dentist to look after’, I can’t quite work it out myself,’ he said. ‘They handed out money like it was lolly water, but then they take no responsibility when everyone is turning up the dentist.’”
“Ryan said the market had already fallen 20%, but the data was lagging because sellers were refusing to accept the new going-rate, resulting in sales not happening, and the true prices buyers were willing to pay not being captured by analysts. ‘It’s a classic example of does the person in the boiler room of the Titanic actually understand what’s happening on the deck? I don’t think he (Orr) has a very good sense of where business and people’s attitude is.’ Ryan said there was no doubt buyers in 2021 overpaid, after giving in to a ‘sheep mentality.’”
Daily Mail Australia. “The managing director of a collapsed building giant is at risk of losing his $5million luxury mansion – with furious creditors setting their sights on the waterfront palace. Oracle Building Corporation Pty Ltd – also known as Oracle Hunter Homes and Oracle Platinum Homes – was wound up at a general meeting on Wednesday, leaving up to 300 half-built properties across Queensland and NSW. At least one creditor the company’s boss, Tom Orel, owes money to has since laid a legal claim on his six-bedroom home on the Gold Coast.”
“But the Orels still have the property to return to, while hundreds of families can only despair at their dreams of building a new house – after the builder spectacularly went under. Would-be homeowners flooded social media to express their anger and devastation as the company collapsed. ‘We just lost our deposit,’ one customer claimed … ‘Oracle Platinum Homes has gone into liquidation.’ Another said they had ‘just lost $25k’. ‘Biggest nightmare of our lives dealing with this company, so much money lost, no compassion or understanding,’ another post read.”
The Sixth Tone on China. “Wang Xudong and Zhou Zongzhen pick their way through the darkness toward their home: a half-finished apartment block on the outskirts of Xi’an. The 33-story building is little more than a concrete skeleton. Its façade hangs open, the brick walls connecting the columns only half-built. Plastic tarpaulins flap against the scaffolding in the late evening breeze. Wang and Zhou have occupied one of the empty units on the fourth floor. There is no running water or electricity, a single solar lamp providing the sole illumination. The only furniture consists of two single iron beds pushed against one wall, and an unpainted wooden board serving as a makeshift table.”
“But the pair, who are both 60 years old, have resolved to put up with the basic conditions. They feel they have no other choice. ‘Although life is rudimentary here, we no longer have to worry about the monthly rent,’ Wang tells Sixth Tone. ‘We bought it. We own it. It’s our home.’”
“Wang, Zhou, and nearly 100 other homeowners moved into the unfinished apartment compound — Jinling Apartment — just over three months ago. It was an act born of desperation and defiance. Like thousands of others in China, they have poured their savings into buying a presale apartment — only to see the developer fall into financial difficulties and halt construction on the project.”
“A dozen workers arrived to add the insulation layer to the building’s outer wall, and hundreds more window glass panes were delivered to the site, according to Wang. But before the windows could be installed, the workers had disappeared again. ‘I felt cheated,’ says Wang. ‘The court said executing the judgment can wait until the developer has the capital in its account.’”
“Song Jia, 45, bought one of the units inside Jinling Apartment shortly after getting divorced. During the initial disputes with the developers, she was living in an urban village across town. Each time the homeowners met at the development, she had to travel for six hours, changing buses twice. Later, she moved closer, but she has also had to move multiple times due to the sweeping redevelopment. The stress has taken a heavy toll on Song, who spoke with Sixth Tone using a pseudonym for privacy reasons.”
“‘When I bought this home, I thought that instead of renting a house I could have a nest of my own after getting divorced. But the reality is I have been drifting around all these years,’ says Song, bursting into tears. ‘No one knew the road ahead would be so difficult. Every time I want to cry, I pretend to laugh.’”
“A 67-year-old homeowner, surnamed Qu says he sometimes struggles to sleep at night, tortured by the idea that he has ‘been fooled.’ ‘I was willing to do all kinds of hard and dirty work during the first half of my life. The idea was that no matter how hard I worked, I had to buy a flat in the city,’ says Qu, who grew up in a mountainous part of Shaanxi with scant health care resources. ‘The fate of this home will determine my whole life. I bought it because I hope to spend the rest of my life here … I’m very distressed.’”